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Betty White

When Marni (Kristen Bell) realises her brother Will (James Wolk) is about to marry, Joanna (Odette Annable) the girl who bullied her in high school, she sets out to expose his fiancée’s true colours.

There are so many things that do not work in You Again but perhaps the main thing is that there’s more chemistry between Bell and Wolk who are playing siblings, than Wolk and Annable who he’s engaged to. From the opening scenes where you learn how terrible Marni’s high school life was, her brother Will is always there to jump to her defence and while sibling relationships like that are great, as the film goes on the dynamic between them feels far closer than two siblings should be. And as Marni’s vendetta against Joanna grows, it often feels like no one would be good enough for her brother, not just the fact that Joanna bullied her in school. It could well be Kristen Bell’s fault for being adorable and being able to bounce off just about anyone.

There’s some brilliant female talent in You Again but due to a poor script (people who are a part of the same family talk to each other like their just acquaintances a lot of the time) and a generic plot, they don’t really get to show off their comedic talents that well. Jamie Lee Curtis plays Marni and Will’s mother while Sigourney Weaver plays Joanna’s aunt. Turns out that they were friends in high school that drifted apart for some unknown reason, so there are two generations of feuding women here. Betty White is in it too and she has some of the funniest moments, and while Kristen Bell is charming she is not great here.

The central themes of this film are not handled well. The messages that everyone can change, people can deserve second chances, high school shouldn’t define the rest of your life – they’re all great but are bigger and more sensitive themes than this not that funny comedy can handle. The conflict between Weaver and Curtis’s characters was more interesting and neutral. This is because for a long time you don’t know why they fell out, and neither does Jamie Lee Curtis’s character, and when everything comes to ahead you can see both sides and no one was the out and out villain. Unlike the situation between Marni and Joanna where Marni suffered a lot at the hands of Joanna and her friends, and there’s no way anyone who was bullied would want the bully to be a part of their family.

I’m potentially going too deep in what’s supposed to be a fun comedy, and comedies can have serious messages or stories in them, but You Again just doesn’t do enough to make you feel sympathy for Joanna or forgive her.

You Again has a few funny moments, Curtis and Weaver’s characters and history are interesting, but on the whole You Again is just a mindless watch with nothing that memorable about it. 2/5.